Day: April 14, 2015

The assassination of President Abraham Lincoln on Good Friday, April 14, 1865, had a tremendous impact both in the United States and abroad. People in Great Britain, which had favored the South, mourned as if Lincoln had been their leader. France, whose citizens had made no secret of their sympathy for the Union, paid tribute in verse and song. All eyes were on this struggling American democracy, so aptly personified in the person of Abraham Lincoln, and the world mourned his passing.

The presidential box at Ford Theater

The pursuit of the assassin, John Wilkes Booth, was one of the most extensive manhunts ever mounted by the United States government. The search lasted twelve days, by which time the body of President Lincoln, transported by rail on a thirteen-day journey to Springfield, Illinois, for burial, was half way to its resting place. Unending crowds of mourners lined the tracks between Washington and Springfield to pay their final respects to the martyred President Abraham Lincoln.

Lincoln on his deathbed, 1865

Unconscious, Lincoln was carried from Ford’s Theatre to the nearby house of Williams Peterson at 453 10th Street. There, in a room rented to William Clark, a boarder, Abraham Lincoln died at 7:22 a.m., April 15, 1865. The artist’s conception of the deathbed scene is shown here with the dying President surrounded by his family, members of the Cabinet, (excluding Seward, who had been seriously stabbed in an assassination attempt the same night), officers, and physicians. When Lincoln died Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton is reported to have uttered his famous remark, “Now he belongs to the ages.”

Below are images of President Lincoln and Allen Pinkerton. (the founder of Pinkerton security. Signed on as the first secret service by Lincoln–the same day of his assassination. He also refused their security that fateful night at Ford’s Theater.

Pinkerton security. Allen Pinkerton is seated on the left. (without top hat). Lincoln during the day civil war with Allen Pinkerton (left).